Commentary: Simply a great episode. Walter Koenig shines every time he portrays Alfred Bester, and this ep is no exception. He gets to say one of my absolute favorite lines from the series here:

Garibaldi: And if I had a baseball bat, we could hang you from the ceiling and play pinata.Bester: A pinata, huh? So, you think of me a something bright and cheerful, full of toys and candy for young children. Thank you! That makes me feel much better about our relationship.

And then we've got G'Kar hitting absolute ROCK BOTTOM, buying some illicit Dust, stumbling to Londo Mollari's quarters, assaulting Londo and Vir, and then having a little excursion inside Mollari's mind to find out the truth about Londo's role in everything that's been happening lately. And, just as Kosh took advantage of Sheridan's altered state of mind in All Alone In the Night to deliver to him in a dream, Kosh does the same thing to G'Kar here. The basic message, and a tenet which G'Kar carries with him for the remainder of the series:

Kosh (as G'Lan): We are fighting to save one another...and some of must be sacrificed if all are to be saved.

Something else I find very interesting about the dream sequence is that when G'Kar asks "Who are you?" Kosh dodges the question! This is the fundamental Vorlon question, mind you, the one that the Vorlons ask to just about EVERYONE ELSE during the course of the series, including torturing Delenn with it just months previous to this (in Comes the Inquisitor), and now Kosh can't answer it himself.

Also of note...Dust, which has been mentioned as far back as the series pilot, was in reality a failed experiment of the Psi Corps. It was originally manufactured to try to turn mundanes into telepaths, but failed miserably. They do, however, continue to circulate it among humans to try and see if it'll work eventually.

Fun Fact: The Minbari "Ceremonial Shirt of Welcoming" that Vir wears in the beginning of the episode...the Minbari letters on the shirt, translated, spell out "ALOHA".

G'Kar takes the dust because it could be a weapon that can be easily hidden. Moreover, it allows the user to rape the mind of another. After the destruction of his home world by the Centari, and Londo's personal betrayal of him, that is what G'Kar intends to do.

But he gets more than he expected.

After assaulting Vir, and abducting Londo,G'Kar takes Londo's mind. Now, Londo is not an uncomplex character, and we see all the events in his life, and visions that he has. But as G'Kar prepares to go deeper, he has a vision.

G'Kar sees his dead father, murdered in the invasion of his home, hanging from a tree. Then, a vision of Kosh, as a Narn angel.

And the great warrior is changed.

Accepting punishment for his assaults, and use of a banned drug--kind of light it seems to me--G'Kar begins the contemplation that will make him a religious icon for his people.

I pointlessly search for a reason to exist
And find only dust remains
And as the dust slips away through my hands
I think of you... I think of you

Am I so naive to actually believe
That I deserve love? And am I so wrong to
Miss you so much that I only want to die?
Thoughts of you make me want to die

Now I'm alone and lost, wandering with no destination
Doomed to be forgotten and forever unlovedI yearn to be remembered but my life is only transientTransient as the dust that's slipping through my hands

I pointlessly search for a reason to exist
And find only dust remains
And as the dust slipsaway through my hands
I think of you... I think of you

Am I so naive to actually believe
That I deserve love? And am I so wrong to
Miss you so much that I only want to die?
Thoughts of you make me want to die

-- Culebra (with permission)

This is the first Culebra tune that was truly memorable. The first time we played it, we knew that if any of our songs would ever be played on the radio, it would be this one. Christa Laboulliere is responsible for the original lyrics, although a few lines have been slightly altered over time to better fit the music.